Justin Spiers

In the Zoo Series, the camera offers a means of rendering more visible the glass barrier between the spaces of viewing and viewed. This mediating layer, which is meant to be clear and not seen, becomes a kind of third space, full of illusory reflections and a patina of scratches and marks. This series refutes the clarity and objectivity of the scientific eye, instead of a technologically aided observation of nature, the images present a dark and obscured view into the animal enclosures.

Our encounters with animals are often mediated through a context of entertainment and leisure. I am interested in the ways that these experiences are fabricated and why. My images explore our relationship to non-human animals and raise questions regarding our power over them. By considering obscure aspects within this framework we examine our relationship to – and increasingly our construction of- the natural world.